The Alabama Department of Transportation says tolling is essential to finance the $4.15 billion first phase of the Mobile River Bridge and Bayway project, a price tag that exceeds Alabama’s annual transportation budget and has continued to grow because of construction inflation.
The project includes a new six-lane, 215-foot-tall, cable-stayed bridge over the Moble River, a widening of the existing Bayway from four lanes to six lanes through restriping, and related improvements designed to reduce congestion, improve freight movement and provide a direct interstate route for hazardous-material trucks that cannot use the Wallace Tunnel.
Construction is expected to begin this year and continue through about 2031. Tolls would not be collected until the project opens to traffic.
Why tolls are being used
ALDOT says federal officials told the state more than a decade ago that the project would require an innovative financing plan involving loans, bonds or a public-private partnership. The public-private partnership arrangement, which was part of the project back in 2019, was scrapped after local Metropolitan Planning Organizations voted to remove the project from their planning documents amid a public outrage over tolling…